Hybrid supercomputer in Los Alamos Nat’l Lab.

Scientists want faster, more powerful high-performance supercomputers to simulate complex physical, biological, and socioeconomic systems with greater realism and predictive power. In May, Los Alamos scientists doubled the processing speed of the previously fastest computer.Roadrunner, a new hybrid supercomputer, uses a video game chip to propel performance to petaflop/s speeds capable of more than a thousand trillion calculations per second.”The computer is a speed demon. It will allow us to solve tremendous problems,” said Thomas DAgostino, head of the National Nuclear Security Administration, which oversees nuclear weapons research and maintains the warhead stockpile.The computer might also have many medical and science applications, including developing biofuels or discovering drug therapies.